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Simple digital drawing tutorial

I want to show you guys a step-by-step guide I made of how I draw very simple pokemon, for all digital artist out there u v u I will be drawing my character, a fashionista Cranidos ~

This is a very simple tutorial for beginners, so I only do cell shade style in the most basic way !

Tools used: SAI Paint tool (but you can use same technique in other programs which has layers, just with a bit difference)
Time elasped: 47 minutes

1. basic sketching

Put down some basic sketch in block shape and make what looks like a Cranidos ! This will be use for guidance later. Be wild with your sketch ! It should loosely resemble what your final work will look like.- Tips: Use basic block shape for such as circle, rectangles, triangles... for this step

2. detail sketching

Lower the basic sketch layer's opacity for easier view. Add a new layer on top of it and start sketching on the basic sketch layer. Adjust until it looks fine to you, because this will be guidance for your lineart ! Deleted the basic sketch layer after you are done.- Tips: Make a clean and neat sketch this time, because it will be easier for you to make lineart on it

3. lining

Lower the final sketch layer's opacity and add a new layer. Use a soft brush in dark color to make soft and smooth line. Draw your lineart with various brush size, or go back and use eraser tool to smoothen it out, That way it will look softer and make the picture more dimensional ! After you are done, delete the sketch layer.- Tips: Make your canvas very big, 2 or 3 times as big as you want the drawing to be. Why ? Because even if your lineart may be sketchy and messy, when you resize it the drawing will look quite nice ! Also don't ever use plain black for the lines, use some color softer such as dark brown or even a dark shade of blue ! As long as it isn't black.

4. basic coloring

Fill in with blocks of colors ! You may use magic wand tool and bucket tool to color, or just simply use a brush and fill in like a coloring book. DO NOT COLOR ON THE LINEART LAYER !!! You make layers under the linart layer, and start coloring. - Tips: Each color belong in separated layer (i.e blue in one layer, grey in one layer) so it will be easier for you to color and shade later on.

5. basic shading

Lay down some dark shading on your color layers ! Be sensible with this and put down the shade acording to what you think the lights won't hit. In here I use the cell-shade technique, so no bluring, smudging or blending here, just use the same brush you use to color to put down the shade.- Tips: Don't just use darker colors of your primary colors, mix it with another shade of colors (i.e in here I mixed the colors with shades of blues because I want to use blue as the main shade of the object)

6. detail shading

Pick another colors darker than your previous shades, and brush it on with the same brush. Same rules apply as basic shading, be sensible with it.- Tips: In here I only use 2 shades because it's just a simple drawing, but it depends on you how many shades you want to use ! The more shade the more pretty I think, but only if you know how to use them properly...

7. highlight shading

Pick a lighter colors of the primary colors, and start brushing them on for highlight shading. Same rules apply as above.- Tips: Don't go overboard with this, it may look overly shiny/bright.

8. Final adjustment

Adjust the colors to your liking ~ In here you can see I changed the color of the lineart to blue and make it lighter/darker in a few places. I also adjusted the color to make it more glossy/blue-ish, kind of like color wash.- Tips: Use the Hue Saturation adjustment and Brightness Contrast adjustment. Just play around with it to see which you like best.

And it's done !

I hope you guys find it helpful u v u I'm not a professional, but I do have experience with digital drawing and I thought I would share with you guys. Forgive me if I forget or got something wrong Q 7 Q If you have any question don't hesitate to ask ! And mod please stickie this u v u

And to members, I would love to see your feedback or even drawing using this tutorial so post them all here ! Also I'm currently taking request/suggestion to draw simple pokemon as demonstration, you can ask for it through PM/VM me. I cannot guarantee your request will be done, but if it would I will post it here ^^

You need to have a tablet for this kind of thing though... Which I don't have. What kinds of tablet would you recommend??

Oh actually no, you don't really need a a tablet ^^ Even though I was using it in the tutorial, before I have a tablet I have been drawing with mouse (and even before that, the horrible laptop mousepad) for quite a long time, using the same technique. What I did was draw in the line, and after that go back using the eraser tool and just try to make the line as smooth as possible. They came out just fine, just like how you do the line with tablet pen (only take much longer amount of times that is).

But if you want my opinion on my tablet, I would suggest the products from Wacom. If you are going to use your tablet for non-serious drawing, or if you just begin with digital drawing, the Bamboo Wacom is a quite good one to get, I myself had one. It's quite cheap, and last for a long time as I have been using mine for 2 years but it still work like the first day. And it came with a lot of pen nibs that last for long, mine came with 5 more extra pen nibs, but I haven't even use up my first one yet, even though I have been drawing/using it a lot for the past 2 years. The tablet also came with Corel Painter ~ If you are professional in digital drawing, you could always get the more expensive tablets such as the Wacom Intuos, though I have never had one such as that so I don't know what to tell you about. My friends who are professional digital artist however, also use the Wacom Bamboo tablet, which is quite good.

In my opinion, the tools you used don't really matter to tell the truth though. Whether you have SAI or MSpaint, if you have tablet or not, if you put hard work and practice on using the tools to draw your drawing will come out as fine as any other tools. So practice is the key ! ^^

Oh, how so ? I thought I was being quite descriptive with it... The technique could be easily use if you have GIMP, Photoshop or even Paint.net as long as the program has layers system. If you tell me which part that you could not do, I can always think of something to help : )

Well I gave it a shot:Clickie~
My shading needs work but it was fun to do this. ^_^

Also just to show that anyone can do it, here is more examples using Photoshop/MS Paint.Drawn and colored on MS Paint. (wow Paint is different on Windows 7, compared to Vista/XP. T n T;; So I don't recommend using MS Paint if you have Win7 unless you know how to use this properly) Oh those white pixels. ;w; No matter what I did, they wouldn't disappear... (even with some editing on Photoshop)

Well I gave it a shot:Clickie~
My shading needs work but it was fun to do this. ^_^

Also just to show that anyone can do it, here is more examples using Photoshop/MS Paint.Drawn and colored on MS Paint. (wow Paint is different on Windows 7, compared to Vista/XP. T n T;; So I don't recommend using MS Paint if you have Win7 unless you know how to use this properly) Oh those white pixels. ;w; No matter what I did, they wouldn't disappear... (even with some editing on Photoshop)

Oh I love that Luxray, how nice u v u I haven't tried using MSpaint on Win7 before haha, sounds like it is one tough cookie to handle xDD

Originally Posted by PopPrincess_Lyra

ooh i better try this when I bother :3 looks great to try! nya~

I would love to see your attempt on drawing using this tutorial u v u Hope you can try it out soon ~!

Oh I love that Luxray, how nice u v u I haven't tried using MSpaint on Win7 before haha, sounds like it is one tough cookie to handle xDD

I would love to see your attempt on drawing using this tutorial u v u Hope you can try it out soon ~!

Thank you! I just noticed some parts are a bit choppy. Rather than brushing in the basic colors, I just used the Wand and Bucket to put in the colors. It's just with or without anti-alias, things seem to screw up. >_< I'll try to not be lazy and simply color with brushes or other tools. :I But yes it was my first time using MS Paint too and I am disappointed with how Win7 MS Paint has anti-alias on their brushes. It's hard erasing things now. D: (which is why there's white squares around the edges)

The tutorial did help me with CGing which is something I want to get better at. Again, thank you for the tutorial!!

Thank you! I just noticed some parts are a bit choppy. Rather than brushing in the basic colors, I just used the Wand and Bucket to put in the colors. It's just with or without anti-alias, things seem to screw up. >_< I'll try to not be lazy and simply color with brushes or other tools. :I But yes it was my first time using MS Paint too and I am disappointed with how Win7 MS Paint has anti-alias on their brushes. It's hard erasing things now. D: (which is why there's white squares around the edges)

The tutorial did help me with CGing which is something I want to get better at. Again, thank you for the tutorial!!

Maybe you should get Paint Tool SAI, its brushes are customized and you can CG them the way you want. And I second what you say. I did a similar thing that he did back when I always drew in 2012, and it was hard until he helped me find a way to change the color and CG my drawings properly. Even when I didn't have a tablet until I learned to find a way to do almost not wobbly lineart.

Maybe you should get Paint Tool SAI, its brushes are customized and you can CG them the way you want. And I second what you say. I did a similar thing that he did back when I always drew in 2012, and it was hard until he helped me find a way to change the color and CG my drawings properly. Even when I didn't have a tablet until I learned to find a way to do almost not wobbly lineart.

It's funny you say that when I was drawing with SAI. XD Not the Emolga drawing because I was terribly demonstrating how you don't need to have a million dollars and a whole science crew to make art and follow this tutorial to a T.

But the Wand tool still doesn't like me. :S I would've tried my hand at Photoshop too if I wasn't so lazy to plug my tablet into my laptop and if it wasn't 2 AM in the morning, ahaha.

You can use the vector tools on SAI if you don't have a tablet. (alternatively, the Pen Tool on all Photoshop versions) I know goldensteambun mentioned this elsewhere already but sometimes when I make purdy sketches on paper and want to color it digitally, I either scan it with a scanner or take a picture. Either option will equal me linearting it (unless the sketch is that clean there's no point but what is clean sketching)

I still can't really grasp how you manage to get the proportions so accurate and the lines so clean. I'm using Photoshop and I don't really get past the initial sketching phases cos it just looks awful at times I think it'd just be easier to draw something the old fashioned way then upload it to play with, guess that'd take ages though (you must be some sort of wizard to pull off something like that Cranidos in under 50 minutes...) Any tips or experience with Photoshop appreciated!

I still can't really grasp how you manage to get the proportions so accurate and the lines so clean. I'm using Photoshop and I don't really get past the initial sketching phases cos it just looks awful at times I think it'd just be easier to draw something the old fashioned way then upload it to play with, guess that'd take ages though (you must be some sort of wizard to pull off something like that Cranidos in under 50 minutes...) Any tips or experience with Photoshop appreciated!

Well, I don't really use photoshop to draw so I won't be able to tell you tips of it u v u;; But to my knowledge photoshop and SAI both have the same functioned tools/brush to use, and I have heard that using photoshop is even better for digital drawing xDD

Actually my lines aren't quite that clean and neat as you said ! They are very very very messy. But a tip I could give, which is quite simple and basic but most people ignore or underestimate the effect of it, is to make your canvas as big as possible. The Cranidos drawing of mine you see above is only 30% and the one below is 50% of the original canvas size. This is the original size view:

Here I will show you another example:

this is the 100% view of the drawing. The lines are quite messy as you can see !

this is after you resize it, which is 30% of the original canvas. It looks clean doesn't it ~?

I have been telling people this like a thousands times, because usually people think it doesn't matter or it won't affect much, but it does ! You should make your canvas about 200% to 400% bigger than the size you want to make your drawing. Afterward when you resize it, it look really really clean. I wasn't being quite careful with the Cranidos drawing actually, not to mention lazy with colors, so it only took that amount of times u v u;;